Does Google factor in site traffic, time on site, bounce rate, etc into it's ranking algorithm?
-
I can't seem to find an authoritative answer on this.
-
If Google came out today and said "site traffic, time on site and bounce rate are all going to be factors of our algorithm" then ethically-challenged individuals and companies may considering banks of users based in places with low labour costs to try to manipulate the algorithm.
It is almost certain that Google has considered this in the past but is worried that people may try and game the system. As such I would expect any ranking element related to the quality of a site to be more complex.
There are suggestions that Google is trying to get algorithms to be able to judge the aesthetic quality of a site and that this could be a factor in the future
-
You won't find any authoritative answer on this, some sort of bounce could be used by Google but you will never know the % for this specific bounce rate.
-
Yep! thanks!
-
Of course Google may not come right out and say it, but this article seems to make a case that bounce rate is a factor: http://seoblackhat.com/2008/11/21/bounce-rate-seo/
And here's an interesting Google blog post where site speed is a confirmed signal of their algorithm: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2010/04/using-site-speed-in-web-search-ranking.html
Hope this helps!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Anyone suspect that a site's total page count affects SEO?
I've been trying to find out the underlying reason why so many websites are ranked higher than mine despite seemingly having far worse links. I've spent a lot of time researching and have read through all the general advice about what could possibly be hurting my site's SEO, from page speed to h1 tags to broken links, and all the various on-page SEO optimization stuff....so the issue here isn't very obvious. From viewing all of my competitors, they seem to have a much higher number of web pages on their sites than mine does. My site currently has 20 pages or so and most of my competitors are well in the hundreds, so I'm wondering if this could potentially be part of the issue here. I know Google has never officially said that page number matters, but does anyone suspect that perhaps page count matters towards SEO and that competing sites with more total pages than you might have an advantage SEOwise?
Algorithm Updates | | ButtaC1 -
Any Google Algorithm update?
Did Google release any seo update in last couple of days? My client is seeing 33% low traffic. The site is hyper-local marketplace website in India.
Algorithm Updates | | Avin1230 -
Google Page Rank not improving
Hi All, I have a site live with a homepage rank of 5, Ever since relaunching (on the same domain) 6 months ago the inner page rank has remained at NA. Its crawled pretty consistently, Can anyone think of a reason this may be happening? www.glowm.com
Algorithm Updates | | thebluecubeuk0 -
What are tips for ranking on Google Maps?
I have another thread going where everyone is saying to keep both the Places profile as well as the Google Plus Local profile I have for my company. I have another person telling me that it has a negative effect to have both accounts at the same time so I'm assuming thats why the listing never comes up on places unless you zoom all the way into the map to the address of the storefront. With that being said, can anyone provide some good tips for ranking first page on google maps? Goole Plus Local - https://plus.google.com/114370561649922317296/about?gl=us&hl=en Google Places - https://plus.google.com/103220086647895058915/about?gl=us&hl=en
Algorithm Updates | | jonnyholt1 -
Will Ranking Reports be Affected with the new Google Changes?
For example: Raven stopped use of scraped Google, SEMRush data on Jan. 2 Raven stopped offering unauthorized Google SERP rankings and keyword data (a.k.a. scraped Google data) on Jan. 2, 2013. The change included the retirement of the SERP Tracker and the elimination of SEMRush data from the Raven platform. Raven has released new SEO performance reports that make it easy to show clients the impact of campaigns to improve organic traffic. Raven will continue to upgrade reports through the year. We thank the many customers who continue their business with Raven. More details about the SEO performance reports and other recent releases are available Is SEOMoz protected in some way? Or will you have to give up rankings reports too?
Algorithm Updates | | MSWD0 -
Why Am I Ranking in Bing but Not Google
My website is ranking is ranking in Bing, but it's nowhere to be found on Google? What can be some causes for this?
Algorithm Updates | | locallyrank0 -
Why would my keywords never ranking in Bing but have great position in both Google and Yahoo?
I have several keywords ranking top 5 for Google and Yahoo but nothing from Bing. Any ideas?
Algorithm Updates | | CIEEwebTeam0